Power to the (wealthy) People!

WHEN THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION got into full gear in the united states after the war between the states, and factories sprang up throughout the country, (in cities) workers who were crammed together in so called "sweatshops" took notice of their common circumstances.

To wit, they noticed that they all shared the same plight: long hours, poor working conditions, and low pay, with no way to address these issues. In an eureka moment they started organizing themselves into what became known as "labor unions", thinking that this might give them an opportunity to stand up to owners and employers on a more equal basis for purposes of negotiating.

It didn't work all that badly. Throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries conditions of workers gradually got a bit better, labor unions grew, and by the time world war two ended, about twenty five percent of american workers were members of unions.

during the war, american workers had promised not to whine, gripe, or quit, but with the war ended, they thought maybe they should be given a piece of the pie, and turned frisky. Well, we simply couldn't have that, now could we? Profits come first in business.

The "Taft-Hartley Act" of 1947, which labor unions called the "slave labor act" was corporate america's way of putting the peasants in their place. President Harry Truman vetoed it, then, when his veto was overridden, decided he might as well take advantage of it, and several times he invoked it (taft-hartley), such as in the great steel strike, to which he put a summary end.

Taft-Hartley greatly limited the power of labor unions to institute a closed shop, (one in which all workers must be union members and pay union dues), to strike, to organize politcal campaign contributions, and to do damned near anything else.

Taft-Hartley is still in effect. Not only that, but now we have these "right to Work" laws in twenty four of the fifty states, the most recent being michigan, which joined the corporate owners club just the other day. Obama, visiting michigan and full of reelected salt and vinegar, told the nation that right to work is all about politics, not economics. Well, he's wrong, its about economics too.

Its about keeping worker's wages down, and corporate profits and CEO salaries up. The conservative corporate crowd celebrates right to work laws as stimulates to business, and economic prosperity. Indeed, anyone wanting to expand corporate operations into a new part of the country is gonna do so first where pesky labor unions have little or no power, and workers can be controlled.

Only about ten percent of american workers belong to unions now, and in real terms, worker's wages have fallen consistenly for decades, while corporate profits have climbed, as have executive salaries.

Our politicians, whose political careers are bought and paid for by corporate owners, are thrilled by the demise of the workers. Wouldn't you be, if you were a big business owner, or a politician whose  repeated reelection was enabled by said owners? Yes, you would.